Table Of ContentCultural,Ethnic,and Political
Nationalism in Contemporary Taiwan
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Cultural, Ethnic, and Political
Nationalism in Contemporary
Taiwan
Bentuhua
Edited by
John Makeham and A-chin Hsiau
CULTURAL,ETHNIC,ANDPOLITICALNATIONALISMINCONTEMPORARYTAIWAN
© John Makeham and A-chin Hsiau,2005.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2005 978-1-4039-7020-6
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First published in 2005 by
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ISBN 978-1-349-53182-0 ISBN 978-1-4039-8061-8 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9781403980618
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Cultural,ethnic,and political nationalism in contemporary Taiwan :
bentuhua / edited by John Makeham and A-chin Hsiau.
p.cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1.Nationalism—Taiwan.2.Ethnicity—Taiwan.3.Democratization—
Taiwan.4.Taiwan—Politics and government.I.Makeham,John,1955–
II.Hsiau,A-chin.
DS799.847.C85 2005
320.54(cid:1)095124(cid:1)9—dc22 2005040471
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
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First edition:August 2005
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents
Introduction 1
I. Democratization and Nationalism
1. “Taiwanization” in Taiwan’s Politics 17
J. Bruce Jacobs
2. Why Bother about School Textbooks?:
An Analysis of the Origin of the Disputes
overRenshi TaiwanTextbooks in 1997 55
Fu-chang Wang
II. Identity in Literature
3. Being/Not Being at Home
in the Writing of Zhu Tianxin 103
Rosemary Haddon
4. The Indigenization of Taiwanese Literature:
Historical Narrative, Strategic
Essentialism, and State Violence 125
A-chin Hsiau
III. Memory and the Built Environment
5. Reading History Through
the Built Environment in Taiwan 159
Jeremy E. Taylor
vi Contents
IV. The “China-centered” Paradigm
and Indigenization
6. Indigenization Discourse in Taiwanese
Confucian Revivalism 187
John Makeham
7. The Movement to Indigenize the Social Sciences
in Taiwan: Origin and Predicaments 221
Maukuei Chang
Epilogue:Bentuhua—An Endeavor for Normalizing
a Would-Be Nation-State? 261
A-chin Hsiau
Notes on Contributors 277
Index 279
Introduction
John Makeham
The purpose of this volume is to make a timely contribution to
analyzing what is arguably the single most important aspect of cultural
and political change in Taiwan over the past quarter-century: the trend
toward “indigenization” (bentuhua ). In Taiwan, indigenization
has functioned as a type of nationalism that champions the legitimacy
of a distinct Taiwanese identity, the character and content of which
should be determined by the Taiwanese people. As such, it has con-
tributed to the formation of, and, in turn, been enhanced by, such inter-
related constructs as “Taiwan consciousness” (Taiwan yishi ),
Taiwanese identity (Taiwan rentong ), Taiwanese subjectivity
(Taiwan zhutixing ), cultural subjectivity (wenhua zhutix-
ing ), national culture (minzu wenhua ), and
Taiwan independence consciousness (Taidu yishi ).
This is the first book-length study of the subject in any language
and draws on the expertise of political scientists, literature specialists,
cultural historians, intellectual historians, and sociologists. Focusing
on the indigenization of politics and culture and its close connection
with the identity politics of ethnicity and nationalism, this volume is
an attempt to map prominent contours of the indigenization paradigm
as it has unfolded in Taiwan’s academic and intellectual cultures. The
opening chapters concern the origin and nature of the trend toward
indigenization with its roots in the unique historical trajectory of pol-
itics and culture in Taiwan. Subsequent chapters deal with responses
and reactions to indigenization in a variety of social, cultural, and
intellectual domains.
2 John Makeham
Democratization and Nationalism
In the opening chapter, “‘Taiwanization’ in Taiwan’s Politics,”
J. Bruce Jacobs provides a detailed account of changes in Taiwan’s
political landscape over the past quarter-century, plotting the advances
in democratization and an increasing bentuhua trend during the
1990s. He traces the impetus for these developments to the rise of the
dangwai (literally, “outside the [Chinese Nationalist] Party”) in
the late 1970s. Based on his analysis of articles published in the oppo-
sition movement’s magazine, Meilidao , Jacobs argues that the
key political issue the dangwai movement sought to promote was
democracy: “the issue of ‘Taiwanization’ or bentuhua received
almost no attention at this time.” The first half of the chapter intro-
duces and analyzes the significance of a range of political issues in
the late 1970s and early 1980s. The second half of this chapter deals
with political events in the process of democratization from the late
1980s until today, under the rule of presidents Li Denghui (Chinese
Nationalist Party [Zhongguo guomin dang ; GMD]) and
Chen Shuibian (Democratic Progressive Party [Minzhu jinbu dang
; DPP]). Jacobs concludes, “the key element of politics
under presidents Li and Chen has been ‘democratization’ not Taiwan
‘nationalism’” and insists that it was the process of evolving democ-
ratization that provided the political climate which facilitated the
expression of the bentuhua phenomenon of Taiwan consciousness
rather than the other way around.
Fu-chang Wang’s chapter, “Why Bother About School Textbooks?:
An Analysis of the Origin of the Disputes over Renshi Taiwan
Textbooks in 1997,” is also concerned with political upheavals in
Taiwan such that today, “unlike twenty years ago, ‘Chineseness’ is no
longer regarded as the core element in Taiwanese cultural identity.”
Wang explores this development by framing one particular question
against a broad background of ethnic and nationalistic politics: “In
1989 the Minister of Education decided to add a new course of Renshi
Taiwan (Getting to Know Taiwan) in the seventh grade. The
decision was accepted without any controversy. In June 1997, just
after the Renshi Taiwan textbooks were finally finished and three
months before their scheduled adoption by all seventh graders
throughout the country, a series of disputes and conflicts broke out
over them. The conflicts, in the news media and on the streets, lasted
for two months and ended abruptly when the commissioners in charge
decided to release the textbooks as scheduled after some minor revision
Introduction 3
in the content. Why did the conflicts occur in 1997 and not in 1989,
when the agenda of curriculum reform was passed?”
Wang proposes that the differing responses to the textbook issue in
1989 and 1997 can be attributed to the changing political environ-
ment in Taiwan over the decade that led to the increasing displacement
of what he terms a “China-centered” paradigm by a “Taiwan-
centered” or bentuhuaparadigm.1The first of the chapter’s three parts
describes political and historical developments that led to the develop-
ment of the China-centered paradigm. The second part focuses on the
social and political contexts that gave rise to bentuhua and advances
an explanation for the paradigm change in terms of the development
of ethnic and nationalistic politics in the postwar era in Taiwan. In the
third part of this chapter, Wang discusses the consequences of the clash
between the bentuhua paradigm and the China-centered paradigm,
evaluating the effects “not only in the realm of school textbooks, but
also in Taiwan’s general historical and cultural visions.” While Jacobs
argues that “the key element of politics under presidents Li and Chen
has been ‘democratization,’ not Taiwan ‘nationalism,’” Wang main-
tains that democratic changes during this period—such as the popular
election of all national congressional members (1991, 1992), the may-
ors of Taipei and Kaohsiung (1994), the provincial governor of Taiwan
(1994), and the president of the Republic of China (1996)—were
driven by nationalistic concerns and ultimately by ethnic nationalism.
Identity in Literature
Rosemary Haddon’s essay, “Being/not Being at Home in the Writing
of Zhu Tianxin” (chapter 3), explores the dissonance between the
sentiments expressed in the novella, Gudu (Ancient Capital;
1997), and the exclusionary practices of bentuhua in which Taiwan’s
differences from China are emphasized. Haddon traces the ascendancy
of the bentuhua political movement to the 1980s, one consequence
ofwhich was that by the early 1990s, many “mainlanders” (waishen-
gren )2 felt a growing sense of political and social alienation.
Consistent with what Fu-chang Wang has termed a shift from
a “China-centered paradigm” to a “Taiwan-centered paradigm,”
Haddon similarly identifies a crisis within the émigré community that
“forced a paradigmatic shift from the view of China as the ‘old home’
to a perception of it as the ‘old country’ (yuanxiang), that is, the place
from which one comes and to which it was no longer possible to
return.” Haddon’s focus is on the human face of this paradigm shift.
